Here's How You Cram a Recording Studio Inside a Speeding Train

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Here's How You Cram a Recording Studio Inside a Speeding Train

Justin Stanley connects a tube condenser microphone for an upcoming recording. Stanley is in charge of all of the recordings with Station to Station, but he also has quite a resume of his own. He opened up for the Rolling Stones, spent two months working with Prince, recorded with Eric Clapton, and now can add "played live with Patti Smith" to that list of accomplishments, thanks to this trip.

Above: Moogerfoogers and a vintage Casio Casio SK-5 on a table in the Station to Station recording car. <emn>Below: A Moog Voyager synthesizer - only one of many - inside of the recording car.</emn>

Above: Justin Stanley brought his 1970s Omni Chord to use in the recording studio. Below: Hard drives with dozens upon dozens of musical recordings made on the train. Side note: Don't forget to label your labelmaker.

Above: The ProTools rig for the studio. Below: A microphone taped to the train car window records ambient train sounds while on the road.

The front of the drum set on the train was decorated by John Moloney's girlfriend.

Above: Members of Ariel Pink's Haunted Graffiti play in the mobile recording studio on the Station to Station train. Below: The video crew's slate indicates a song Thurston Moore and John Moloney recorded on the train.

Crew members assemble the recording studio before the train leaves the first station.

Justin Stanley stood in the middle of the Station to Station recording car, lurching back and forth on his feet. The train wasn’t moving. Stanley — the engineer, producer, and musician who oversees the event’s impromptu musical sessions — was demonstrating how performers sometimes looked when the train was in motion. "The first two days, we all felt as if we’d just gotten off a boat," he said. "But I think we’re all used to it now."

Stanley, who met Station to Station mastermind Doug Aitken years ago while playing with Beck, was tapped to assemble a recording studio within the train, which is currently carrying artists and musicians to stops around the country as part of the roving artistic event. With help from legendary instrument company Moog — who provided several synthesizers and pedals, and even a theremin — Stanley organized a still-growing space that includes multiple guitars, a full drum kit, and up-to-the-second recording and playback equipment.

In keeping with Station to Station’s generation-spanning ethos, there’s some throwback gear, as well. At one point, Stanley reaches below banks of equipment and retrieves a classically kitschy old Casio keyboard. "Everyone loves it," he told WIRED. "You get all these crazy bits of gear, and everyone’s like, 'Let’s get out the Casio.'"

As the Station to Station train sat parked in a railyard in Chicago, Stanley began setting up the mobile studio for the inevitable ad hoc recording sessions that would take place once the train pulled out for Minneapolis. So far, Sonic Youth’s Thurston Moore, drummers Ryan Sawyer and John Mohoney, and members of Ariel Pink’s Haunted Graffiti had already stopped by, as had whip-cracker Chris Camp, who’d come in the previous night to play harmonica on what Stanley called "a classic kind of on-the-train, shuffle-blues jam."

This isn’t the first time Stanley has made music in an unconventional space. He recorded drums for future-soul singer Jamie Lidell at Lidell’s home, and worked with singer-songwriter Ryan Bingham at a house in Malibu. "It’s a really Brian Eno thought process," Stanley said of adapting to new environments. "The space is only a benefit, because it gives you this other sound." On the Station to Station car, he even has a microphone attached to the window, to pick up the sound outside. "I don’t mind the bleed. That’s the whole point."

With its narrow walkway and splayed-out lagoons of instruments, the recording car is one of the more popular hang-outs on the Station to Station train (for those who can’t make it onboard for the sessions, don’t worry — they’re being recorded and mixed for later release).

Inside the Station to Station recording studio car. (Click to enlarge)

At the Chicago railyard, an Amtrak conductor, 54-year-old Glen Johnson, sat in the recording car dressed in overalls, and strummed a vintage Silvertone guitar. Johnson — who grew up in Northwest Indiana, watching his grandfathers play guitar — had come in the night before, saw the equipment and "ran into all the eye candy in here," he said.

He ran through a few chords and looked around. "If anyone asks," he said, "I’m on my lunch break."

All photos: Kendrick Brinson/WIRED

Stanley goofs around on the side of the parked Station to Station train during a stop.